I’ve said it before (and was probably met with eye rolls)
but it bears repeating. Covid stole my husband. My heart is broken. My family has been
shattered by this and my glue supply is running short.
My patience with those who refuse to acknowledge the reality
of this pandemic ran short a long time ago.
I’m angry but I do appreciate those of you who are “just exercising your
rights as an American” to be so blatantly uncaring and closed-minded because I
can more easily identify and avoid you now.
Let me be clear about this:
my husband’s death certificate does not mention Covid-19. During his nearly year-long hospitalization
journey, he had dozens of negative Covid tests.
Never once, during any of that testing, was he ever given the antibody
test that I asked for repeatedly. You
see, I am certain that my entire household had Covid in December of 2019. Of course, at this time, no one had ever heard
of Covid and we thought we must have had the flu.
Months went by before we learned about this pandemic and the
common symptoms. To a one, our experience
matched – loss of taste, extended fevers, extreme exhaustion, etc. My daughters
and I were otherwise healthy so we rallied with rest and time. My husband, a kidney transplant recipient,
was already compromised and wasn’t able to fight. Of course, we didn’t know what we were
fighting and there were plenty of things to blame.
You see, as a transplant recipient, he was on a plethora of
anti-rejection medications. Many of
these have their own side effects. He
was not diabetic prior to transplant but one of his medications commonly brings
about diabetes. So when his legs were
swelling and he was retaining fluid, that’s where the doctors’ attention
went. When his vision was failing, that
was also blamed on medications. When,
after the nation was already on pandemic shutdown and he couldn’t go to a
doctor’s office, we headed to the hospital.
Thanks to this new medical crisis, he walked in alone to the emergency
room and was admitted.
That was the last time he walked without assistance. Several swabs confirmed that he was not
positive for Covid so he was parked in a room and barely touched. Assumptions were made about his health
without communicating with him. There
was no communication with me – his wife – and no questions were asked about
what brought him there. It was decided
that this must be kidney failure, so surgery was scheduled to put in a dialysis
port. This surgery was postponed repeatedly
because he had a high fever that wouldn’t break. Test after test finally revealed fungal
meningitis on his brain. A series of antibiotics were tried and tested until
they found one that seemed to work. They proceeded with surgery and sent him
home.
Let me just remind you that he was parked in a hospital room
for weeks by himself. At no point was he
ever gotten out of bed and he received no physical therapy. When he was wheeled from the hospital to the
car, he fell. We got him in the car,
drove home, and he fell again. Strangers
in our neighborhood helped us get him into our house. A home care nurse came and sent him right
back to the hospital because he wasn’t safe at home. Back in the hospital, fever returned and new
tests revealed more about the infection he had and new – very expensive – IV medication
was tried. This would need to be
administered by an infectious disease doctor and it became clear that he couldn’t
safely exit or enter our home. Another
week went by – alone – while a physical therapy center that could accept him
and administer the medication was found.
Transfer to this center is the first time our daughters and
I were able to see him in several weeks.
We transferred him to the PT home door.
Because of the pandemic, we couldn’t go inside, he couldn’t have
visitors, and he was sent to quarantine with more nasal swabs and more time
absolutely alone without physical therapy.
This was his life. This was our
life. There were small steps forward. There were occasional lights at the end of
the tunnel, and he was finally able to return to his home. In home physical therapy got him back on his
feet with aid of a walker.
That sounds like progress, right? Not really.
He never truly returned. He’d
lost about 150 lbs of muscle. He was
weak, he was depressed, he was terrified and he made several trips back and
forth to different hospitals, for new reasons.
Always with isolation and very little communication.
Over time, more information about Covid was revealed and we
were able to connect the dots. The hard
part was getting the doctors to see beyond the chart to actually see the
man in the bed in front of them. During
a later hospitalization, visits were actually permitted. I finally got a doctor to hear me and order tests
that had been overlooked. That’s when it
was revealed that the man in the bed – my husband - had suffered a handful of strokes. Medication wasn’t being administered as it
should be and that is why he was hallucinating and talking to people who weren’t
there.
And so it went. In
and out of hospitals with no advocate. A
patient too weak to ask or answer questions.
Nurses too overwhelmed to see the human being in front of them and
doctors too busy to care.
I realize how that last bit sounds. I don’t blame doctors, nurses, or hospitals
for the suffering my husband endured.
That blame lies squarely on the shoulders of a microscopic virus that
invaded the globe and wreaked havoc on millions of people around the
world. Those millions had families and
friends, and even total strangers who cared about them and who are lost without
them. I’m told that it’s OK to be angry
at a virus. But that doesn’t feel
right. My anger Is reserved for the selfish
hordes who refuse to recognize that they have a part in this.
I have been vaccinated, my children have been
vaccinated. I still wear masks in public
because I believe in science. I believe
in personal responsibility. I believe
that I AM my brother’s keeper. If that
small effort of covering my nose and mouth with a thin piece of cloth can
protect the health of others, I’m cool with that. If that small “sacrifice” allows my children
to go to school, to see their friends, to have a regular life, count me
in.
Know this, though: If
you are one of those folks who are too selfish, too important, too ignorant,
too uncaring, etc. to give a damn about your fellow human beings, I see
you. I’ve taken note and will be backing
away from you. It’s really that simple. It wasn't kidney disease, or meningitis, pancreatitis, or any other "itis" that took him away from us. It was loneliness, isolation, exhaustion and sundry other things unleashed by Covid-19. If you need a face to believe this is real, I'll send you a picture of my husband.
